“Why aren’t they fighting back?” Frankie says, more annoyed than anything. I get it too. It’s pointless attacking a people who aren’t fighting. The moment we all step back from them, they simply get up and go back to work. Then I see Annicka’s amongst them too, though none of us attacked her.
We stand for a moment, feeling all sorts of—well, useless.
Then Franklin says, “We still have to stop them.” And I know she’s right. We don’t have a choice.
Even if all they do while we try to fight is block our punches and kicks, that will be time away from starting their launch, wouldn’t it? Even if it’s all a waste of time. So we get back to trying to beat them up again.
This time I approach a different Metrill, one that Sanaa was fighting. She faces me with her small hands in front of her, waiting for me to attack. And I stop for a moment, watching her bright brown eyes.
I want to hurt her, I decide as I move forward. I have to, else she will kill every living being on the planet. Due to what? Some sort of misguided attempt to ‘cleanse’ the Earth of humanity’s evil?
She’s evil, I decide. She’s evil. And I rush into her, punching and breaking bones. I don’t stop despite hearing things tear and break, despite her wails. Despite the fact that she’s on the ground howling, her hands over her head as she cries.
I can’t stop myself. I’m saving people, I tell myself. I have to hurt her, to save them. My mind tells me to stop—to stop this inherent cruelty in me that I can’t shake.
But I don’t stop kicking and hurting her, not until Blair’s arms wrap around my chest and he pulls me away from the bloody figure.
“It’s enough, Romy.” He nudges me and keeps pushing me back until I’ve taken a breath.
I keep my eyes on his, not wanting to see just how much damage I did to the Metrill. I catch slight movement from the corner of my eye though, and know she’s not dead.
“We’ve stopped them,” he says, as he moves to grab two injured Metrills by their arms. I do the same, leaving the one I beat for someone else to grab. We move them to one corner and find wires and ropes to tie them.
Annicka sits to the side, her head down, her face streaming with tears. She looks up, and I see a massive bruise pop from the right side of her head. “You can’t stop this,” she sniffs. “It has to happen. It is our purpose.”
“We’ve just stopped you Annicka.” I keep my eyes off her bruise.
“No,” another Metrill claims. “You haven’t. Because this is our purpose. We will escape these restraints. And we will follow through with our purpose.”
As we stop and catch our breaths, watching the Metrills sit and stare at us patiently, waiting for us to understand, Sanaa throws her hands up in the air. “They’ll do anything to do this, won’t they?” she says. “We can’t keep them prisoners. They’ll just figure out some way to escape and do this thing.”
I know where she’s going with the words, and I touch her shoulder. “Sanaa,” I say calmly, “we’re not going to assassinate them. That is not the Soren way.”
Well it might very well be Mother’s Soren way, I think, but not ours. Not the way it should be.
“So what do we do with them?” Frankie says.
I haven’t a clue but all I can think of is imprisoning them in their little glassed-in cells. Those are not so easy to escape from, I should know.
Once we’ve moved all the Metrills into the cells, I contemplate getting in touch with the general, to tell her job done, to tell her we don’t ever have to commit to killing an entire people when we can just stop them and—
I’m running again, before I finish my thought. Dammit dammit dammit.
The others run behind me without asking why I’m suddenly in a state of panic.
But it’s simple really. They didn’t try to stop us. They were defending themselves, but the little that I know about the Metrills, I know they’re far faster than that, stronger, smarter.
There are also many more of them than I’d thought.
By the time we’re back at the entrance to the trains, we’re too late.
Five more Metrills have finished what the others started. The trains have already left the site, and they’re on their way to bring about Project Atlantis.
Escape
We’re running again, but this time to another section of the site, where I know some Metrills are heading so they can escape destruction.
We enter a compartment only slightly bigger than the one in the train that brought us here. The train that’s now about to kill every being on Earth, I tell myself. Tears stream down my cheeks.
We make it there just in time. The Metrills look up at us and usher us through to four seats, two in a row.
“They saved these for us,” Blair yells as he straps in. They knew all along. Of course they knew. That’s why they didn’t bother keeping any of this a secret from us. They knew whatever we’d try to do to stop them would be futile.
They knew they’d succeed no matter what. This was their purpose over so many hundreds of years that they worked through every possible scenario.
I sit back in my chair, across from Sanaa. Blair and Franklin sit behind us.
So that’s it then, I think. The train shoots forward and we’re in a dark tunnel. That’s the end of the Earth, the end of humanity. The end of me.
I wonder where the general is, wonder how Mazz and Sophia and the people at the EPrison will see this. I hope she’s saved them as promised. If not, I hope their deaths will be swift and pain-free.
Sanaa’s talking to me but I haven’t heard a single word she’s said since I’m trying to work through my own thoughts, trying to figure out how to mourn all—this.
Trying to fight the guilt that Grandma Mason had—deciding to save one people, at the sacrifice of the entire planet.
What sort of thing is that to decide? Instead of accepting one form of genocide, I just allowed an even bigger one to happen.
And now I’ll survive it too, and will have to live the rest of my life with this—decision.
“It was impossible,” Blair says behind me. The noise of the train is so low that I hear him just fine. “This wasn’t your fault.”
The words are clear enough. But it was, I think. If I’d agreed to what Mother instructed, if we’d just killed them all, instead of trying to fight them—
I know Franklin agrees too but she remains quiet.
“It wasn’t,” he says. “It was an impossible situation and they’re a formidable enemy.”
And they won.
I shut my eyes tight, pushing even more tears onto my cheeks. I decided that their people should live, the few hundreds of them, and now several thousands of people on Earth will die.
How is that not my fault? Of course there’s a voice in my head arguing that not any one decision of mine would have prevented all this.
Then the train slows down and I wonder if they’d tricked us once more and we’re going to be part of the destruction after all. I mean it doesn’t make sense either way—why would they keep us alive? Then again, why would they bother to kill us? We’re not even remotely a threat to them, no matter what we try.
Still, as the train slows more, I decide it’s okay. I’d deserve to die. Maybe not the rest of the team, but certainly me.
It finally comes to a stop and the small door slides open. We let ourselves out of our seatbelts and step out onto a platform, and I catch my breath.
The massive jet in front of us towers over everything like a monolith. And my thoughts are confirmed on how some Metrills intend to survive this.
They’re going off-planet. But where? Before I can answer that, I turn around again to hear a soft hiss from Sanaa as she stares ahead.
Wherever we are, I think this simply can’t be real. Because as we stand, General Mason and Leader Strohm walk up to us, soft smiles on their faces.
Right. Coz you’re so happy to see us—the traitors—the Axiom.
Still, Leader Strohm walks right up
to me and gives me a tight hug. The general simply stands to the side and watches. Then Strohm turns around and rams Blair so hard in the chest, he trips backwards with a loud grunt and falls on the platform.
Before any of us can react, four other military personnel grab the others by both arms and drag them away from us.
Strohm holds me back as I try to fight my way past him to them. They all look back at me, terror in their eyes, and I yell for Strohm to let me go. Of course he doesn’t.
“Welcome home,” he says instead as he holds me tighter in his arms and I scream for my team to be returned to me.
“They’ve accepted our negotiations,” the general says as we sit in her quarters on the ship. “I knew you weren’t about to do as was instructed though you agreed to it, so I sought a different path.”
“And what path is that, General?” I sit still in front of her, wondering where the rest of my team is, wondering what sort of torture awaits them at the hands of her people.
“Our survival of course, Romy,” she says. “I knew you wouldn’t go through with it so I—volunteered—so to speak. My DNA and yours, for all of Rosemary’s memories. I promised to cooperate fully as long as you were saved too. And the EPrison population, of course. I knew you’d be impossible otherwise.”
The jet’s already up in the air, heading towards the Earth’s atmosphere. I wonder just what the destruction below looks like.
“And what about the others?” I ask.
“Where we’re going,” she states, “every person needs to work and cooperate. There’s no space for any—dead weight.”
“They’re not dead weight!” I yell.
“Well as long as they agree to our terms,” she says.
Then she sends me to my quarters on the starboard side of the jet. I can’t see the Earth from here. In fact, all I see is stars. I stare out the window.
“I’m sorry,” I say, my breath leaving a small fog on the window. “I’m so sorry.”
We’ve been stationed on the old compounds on the moon. No new building required. They’re ready for us to move on to it, and begin our new lives.
I spent an afternoon staring at the screens in the northern station as massive storms brewed all over the Earth. As the trains brought about their destruction creating earthquakes underground, the Metrills’ various weather machines engaged in thousands of storms across the planet’s surface. I watched as the Earth’s blue skies turned grey, swirling clouds and tornadoes, not a single patch of colour left.
“The storms will last a hundred years,” they say, “ensuring a full cleanse.”
No chance of survival this time, no one able to find shelter under the ground. I’ll never stand on the Earth again, not in my lifetime.
“A clean slate, so to speak,” the general says.
I’ve pleaded with them to let me see my team but of course they’re still being held, and who knows what’s being done to them.
Still, I beg and plead and beg some more. Finally, I give up. I no longer have any leeway, whether it is with the general or with Leader Strohm. I don’t understand exactly how their relationship works with the Metrills, but I know this much—I’m as much a prisoner as the others.
Then one day, Strohm enters my quarters, fumes rolling off him like waves.
I’d have thought he’d stop with the drinking, what with this new assignment—this new life we’re about to embark on under the watchful eyes of the Metrills.
He walks in with a smile and a slur and steps to the side, allowing Blair to walk in.
At least, at first I think it’s Blair as I stand to greet him. Then I catch an unmistakable blinking on the side of his head. He stares blankly into my eyes, and I scream.
“What have you done to him!” I run up and stop just in front of Blair. I raise my hand as if to touch the blinking thing, but drop it again. Blair’s eyes are still a striking blue as they stare back at me. But he’s not in there.
“What exactly,” Strohm slurs, “do you think a ‘ward’ is, Romy?”
Then he grabs Blair’s arm and shoves him outside my door. “You—” Strohm says, “wait here.”
He locks my door and approaches me, his smile wide.
Strohm
Strohm mumbles and I know he’s had loads more to drink than I thought. Just what I need. I want to walk past him and attend to Blair, but he walks right up to me and starts kissing me though his breath is foul and leaves me cold.
I turn my head away. This is not the same type of alcohol he usually imbibes. This is something far stronger, something used to degrease bots—I’d imagine.
When his hands move up to hold onto my shoulders, rougher than he’s ever held me, my chest constricts and I tell myself just another shove will make him stop. But he doesn’t.
“You don’t want to do this, Strohm,” I warn, placing my hands on his chest, pushing him harder.
“Sure I do. You’re my wife.”
“Only on paper,” I say. “Only for the cameras.”
And not even any more anyway. Sure, there was no ceremony to end it, but after all this time—
“What’s the difference?” he says. “We were heading for this direction anyway, weren’t we?”
I try to remember those early days we had together, the many kisses. But I’m definitely not the same person I was back then. As he pushes me back until I’m on the bed, I realize he’s certainly not the same Strohm.
“I want another child,” he says between kisses on my tight lips.
If this is the only way I have children, by being violated, by having them against my will, I don’t want to have anything more to do with it.
I struggle on the bed and push him back with my arms. He grunts and all two hundred pounds of him land on me and I’m trapped. This is not happening. This can’t be happening.
But when his legs shift and his pants pull down, I know it is. He can’t even hear me anymore.
“Did you ever love me?” he grunts against my neck. “Or are you Masons incapable of that?”
I could have once, but how would I know? Anytime I’d felt affection for him, I found a way to blame it on Stockholm Syndrome. You tell me, I think. Is it possible to love one’s captor? Can that ever be real?
My struggling stops and I lie still, wondering what will happen tomorrow. Wondering if I somehow accepted this when I accepted Mother’s conditions. Hoping he’ll be fast and then he’ll fall asleep.
He grunts again and fumbles for my chest. A strong fume of something long dead and fermented veils my face.
And that’s when I stop feeling numb and get angry.
Really angry.
“Get off me.” I shift and try to roll. He’s drunk, he’s not deaf though he doesn’t listen. “Get off me, get off me. GET OFF ME.” I’m getting louder as I push on him, only realizing he’s getting heavier.
He instructs me to stop struggling, pulls my arms up and above my head and holds my wrists tight with one hand while the other fumbles for the buttons on my pants.
I don’t stop trying to get my arms free but his wiry frame proves stronger than mine. Or it might be the liquid in his veins. Still, his hold on my wrists is tenuous as I continue to struggle and shift.
I raise my knees, meaning to knee him, but only manage to hit the back of his thighs and buttocks. He grunts again.
“If you don’t let me go right now, Strohm, you’d better kill me when you’re done. Because I. Will. Kill. You,” I sob, knowing that I sound more brave than I feel.
He’s nearly got my pants off by now and I fight the nausea in my throat. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment when things turned for the worst for us. But I know the moment I decide I have to leave at any cost. It’s now.
Then I remember that I have a knife tucked under my pillow. A habit I’d formed in Liberty though I didn’t know why. Maybe I knew this day would come.
I watch the throbbing vein in his neck and decide that’s the spot right there. He doesn’t know what I’m up to, he’s so
far gone in what he’s about to do.
My fingers close around the tilt of the blade, I bring it up to my eyesight, then I ram it into the side of Strohm’s neck. He lets go of my other arm so fast, I’m able to throw my hand over his mouth as he tries to wail but only ends up gurgling.
There’s blood everywhere, on my face, on my now-slick hands. I push his face into the bed as he bleeds out. I only take my hand off his mouth once there isn’t a pulse left in him. Then I move back away from him, as far as I can, staring at what I’ve done.
My face is wet with his blood—and maybe my tears, I can’t tell.
Why did I feel so helpless? It was like all my training, everything I knew was nothing but a foggy memory during his drunken attack. Why did he—he did love me once. I thought he did. I was certain he did.
This—this—I stop trying to make excuses for him. He deserved to die, I decide. There was no way around it.
I stare at his body as he convulses for a moment, then stops moving. My breathing’s erratic and my heart’s about to escape. I stand for a moment, still slick with blood.
What do I do? What happens now?
Looking around and realizing I dropped the weapon, I pick it up and move towards the bathroom, where I wash the blood from my hands, my face, the knife.
What do the Metrills do about this sort of thing?
When I step back into my bedroom, the general stands in the middle of the room, with Blair’s bot beside her. She watches me intently and I can’t read the look in her eyes.
I’ve murdered Leader Strohm. I know what the Sorens’ punishment would be.
So when the general steps up to me and wraps her arms around me, I stop breathing.
“What—” I say.
“You don’t have to explain anything,” she whispers. “I’ll take care of it all.”
“But—”
“He attacked you. Didn’t he?” she says, understanding in her voice as she looks down at Strohm’s dead body. “He meant to—hurt you? Right?”
Romy's Last Stand: Book III of the 2250 Saga Page 21